Monthly Archives: November 2016

Rule 1: Store what you eat, and eat what you store. It would be too bad to have a supply of food you would only eat with the greatest reluctance. Also, you can spend a lot of money on a supply of food and other provisions now, but after 15 or 20 years it won’t be much good anymore. Which brings us to the second rule.

Rule #2: Rotate your food supply. Eat the old and replace with new food. It’s great on the pocket book. Large amounts can be purchased when they are on sale, then used when they are not. This may also require you to change your eating habits just a bit – like eating more whole grain and legume foods that are inexpensive but nutritious. But whatever you choose to store, be sure it’s something you can eat or it will never get rotated.

Rule #3: Whatever you store, insure it is as nutritious as possible with the 50 essential elements required for good health. You should also consider storing a good mineral/vitamin supplement.

Rule #4: Special care should be taken in preserving your emergency supply, especially if you plan on storing it for several years. Generally, if you plan on using it up within a year it should be safe to store your dry grains and beans in the paper or plastic bags it came in. But if you do this, be sure you have a cool, dry place to keep it. Bugs are always a serious concern. If you haven’t bug proofed your food you need to check it every few weeks to insure it stays insect free. Aside from packing up your own dry goods, you can also…

Can your garden produce in bottles. This works best for fresh vegetables and fruits, and even meat if it is done correctly. However, know that after two years, wet packed foods in cans or bottles lose much of their nutritional value. Rotation is the key!

Dehydrate your own foods. Some foods that lend themselves well to this kind of food preservation are potatoes, carrots, onions, peppers, and all kinds of fruits. After dehydration, be sure to store them in air tight bags or containers. It would also be a good idea to throw in a couple of oxygen absorber packets.

Whatever method you use to preserve your food, Store it in a cool, dry, dark place.

Rule 5: Learn to grow a garden now before any hard times come. This way you will get the trial and error out of the way before you really need to eat off your garden. For someone who has never grown

a garden before, it is not as easy as it may seem. There is a real art to growing a great garden and this knowledge doesn’t come all at once. Become proficient at it now, and learn now how to preserve

The experts at the FDA have said that the average adult will consume the following amounts of fresh food per year.

Meat – 150 to 200 pounds per year

Flour – 200 to 300 pounds

Sugar or honey – 60 pounds

Fats or Oils – 60 pounds

Salt – 5 pounds

Powdered Milk – 75 pounds

Vegetables and Fruits – 600 to 700 pounds

Water – 375 gallons

(I would also suggest storing items like vinegar and herbs)

The figures above are nice guidelines, but they need to be considered from the technical angle of preserved foods rather than fresh foods.

Meat: Under adverse conditions, people can easily get by with less protein than 150 pounds of fresh meat per year, as that averages to almost a half pound per day! A canned, cooked one pound ham, for example, would be a real treat once a week, and easily feed a family of four. For weekday meals for a family of four, a 5 ounce can of tuna, canned chicken, 12 ounce can of luncheon meat, or 12 ounce can of corned beef can be used in a casserole (or whatever) and provide the required protein.

Flour: The listed amount of 200 to 300 pounds of flour per year is fairly realistic, as in catastrophic conditions people would be making their own bread and pasta, for example. Using a hand cranked mill to produce flour from whole wheat is a sure way to limit the amount of flour required, as it is hard work!

Sugar or honey: The recommended 60 pounds is the absolute minimum needed, in reality far below the actual amount desired, as sweeteners are the carbohydrates needed for energy, and survival is hard work. The 60 pounds listed by the FDA does not take into account home canning, for example, and people will need to make jellies and jams and can fruits, all of which require a considerable amount of sugar or honey.

Fats or oils: Again, this is an absolute minimum amount needed, as 60 pounds of fats or oils does not go far when used in baking, frying, and other uses. In hard times, people actually require fat in their diet in order to do hard work. In every country in which food is rationed, cooking oils are one of the first items of scarcity. Indeed, in Russia last fall cooking oils were almost impossible to find, even though not specifically rationed. Corn oil stores for years, and so does plain, inexpensive hydrogenated lard.

Salt: Whoever at the FDA dreamed this up must have been a nutrition Nazi. Five pounds of iodized table salt would be the recommended minimum per person per year, but what about making kraut, salt preserving meat, or preserving fish in a barrel of salt? For those needs, a family should have at least 50 pounds of fine grade, non iodized salt, available for less then $5.00 from a feed and seed store. Salt is essential to life! Remember the salt caravans from the old days in Africa and the middle East? Salt was worth more than gold!

Powdered milk: The 75 pounds recommended per person is fine, but for cooking needs a couple of cases (48 cans) of canned, condensed milk is an absolute necessity.

Vegetables and fruits: In hard times, greens and fruits can indeed be a vital food item, as they provide the vitamins and minerals our bodies require to remain healthy. Storing vegetables and fruits is where a food dehydrator really shines. Combine the dried veggies with fresh greens from a garden and canned fruit juices and sauces, and the 600 pound per year amount becomes far more attainable.